Are you going wackadoodle? No, this is a double chapter week!
What can I say, I am weak when it comes to your reviews that plead with my soul. You guys deserve some Dotty! So here comes a happy bonus post! (I will be stronger next time, I hope)
I see from reviews, there is a bit of 'dissatisfaction' in a few of you. I implore you; trust in the writer. I know what I'm doing, well, 60% of the time.
The secondary plot may be liked by some, it may just be waffle to some others, but; it serves a purpose to the primary plot so I shall be continuing.
Yes; Letty is obsessed beyond belief and very weak in herself. Again, with her background you see it, but the endgame is the strong, sexy, 'tyre marks on your bitch ass face' Letty we know from film. This is just the journey and you are welcome to come along for the ride. I mean; ride or die, right? Haha.
On a serious note; there are some absolutely FANTASTIC fanfics out there that may be more on your wavelength so if you aren't feeling it, I am not offended, not everybody is going to like this. It's like marmite.
Chapter Fourteen; Touch me.
Letty felt bolt wide awake.
This was surely meant for someone else right? This was massively in error.
Dom had never text her. She only had his number because of work. She was sure he had the same reasoning.
Letty stared at it, as if to expect the 'oops, wrong number' to appear in the next second. But minutes passed and none came.
Letty went for the safe option.
Mia's sleeping over.
The lie she was supposed to be sticking to, at least.
And chances are she's asleep, come over.
Well that sorted out the idea of wrong recipient. He knew exactly who he'd sent the message to and it wasn't in error.
Why?
It was highly suspicious.
Please.
Was all the reply she received.
Letty didn't need telling twice, she swapped pyjama shorts for her jeans and slung a hoodie over the pyjama top she left on.
Every part of her thought it was a bad idea. It was risking her lie for Mia, it was suspicious at best, but it was Dom. Dom was asking her to come over. Dom was saying 'please'.
Letty locked up her empty house and half jogged, half walked the streets across to the Toretto home.
The lights were off in the downstairs. The door locked.
Anxiety sped up her spinal cord.
Something was wrong.
Oh god, what if he'd got stuck under a pile of passed out hookers or something?!
Surely this was a Vince thing?
But… it was only half past midnight, Dom's Supra shouldn't be in the driveway as it was. It should be getting a victory lap or two in at the races. It should be feeling the curved ass imprint on its hot bonnet.
Letty whipped out her phone, needing to know there was no trap from Mia's end.
You still okay?
Mia's text was almost instantaneous. It seemed Letty was the only person even contemplating sleep this early on Friday.
Fantastic. I'll tell you all about it tomorrow. I owe you huge!
Letty pulled out her keys again, the spare key for the backdoor of the Toretto household allowing her into the abode. The door locked as it slid back home and Letty following the familiar route through the Toretto home to the stairs.
The light in Dom's bedroom was shining dull onto the staircase, like a tv light or bedside light turned on low. Letty felt strange as she passed Mia's empty bedroom and pushed on the door of Dom's room.
What if it was all just a joke?
A hoax to poke fun at her?
Her heart was in her throat as she peered her head around the doorframe.
Dom was laid atop his bed covers, one arm behind his head, the other on the tv remote as he channel flipped. He looked up as he felt her gaze. A smile lifted on his lips.
"Come here." His voice was soft, relaxed but deep.
Letty couldn't say no, her world had already spun on its axis at the very thought of being in Dom's bedroom, alone with him; she was too dizzy to decline the hypnotising quality he spoke with. She stepped into his domain but paused next to the bed, she was out of her comfort zone entirely.
"Here." He didn't give her much chance to feel awkward as he sat forward, fingers gently tugging at her sleeve to urge her onto the bed, his legs moving to give her the room.
The back of her legs met the mattress and she fell to the bedding. The dark blues wrapped around her with his cologne and a familiar scent of alcohol.
She took the chance of his channel flipping on the tv to roam her eyes over him.
He still wore the tank top and cargo pants he would have showcased at the races, the leather jacket that would usually accompany them thrown to the otherwise tidy floor. He looked the same as he usually did. But this was a Friday night, well, a really early Saturday morning in technicality and Dominic Toretto was at home? Alone?
There was a tear in the fabric of the universe surely. It explained why she was here.
Or, more possibly, as she noted the open beers can on the bedstand, most likely empty, as the smell suggested, Dom had swapped his indulgence in women to alcohol.
Something really wasn't right.
She'd never seen Dom drunk. Tipsy, joyous, loud and boisterous, but never drunk.
"Stay." Dom's voice found her again and she realised she'd been staring, and she wasn't the only one. His eyes were dragging over her slowly, but it was a different need in them, something deeper than just the primal lust that his body usually hosted at this time of the week.
Letty found herself toeing off her trainers and tucking her legs indian style on the bed.
"Letty…" he began something, but his mind changed as she met his eyes.
He sat forward on the bed, one leg dangling down the side, the other lined straight with her thigh. His warmth flooded her through the jeans.
If she were to speak, would she break whatever moment the gods had bestowed on her?
Dominic Toretto did not ache for her, he did not wish for her late at night. He didn't drink. Yet here he was asking for her company?
It didn't make any sense.
Considering the radio silence for the last week since their 'agreement' Letty was expecting to be forgotten entirely all over again. Not an invite into his inner sanctum.
"How's your arm?" he finally spoke again, glassy eyes lifting back to her tiredly.
"Fine." she whispered, playing with the sleeve that hid the bruising. He called her out of her lie, his body leaning forwards to her across the distance.
She prepared herself for the taunt or tease, the seductive play of words his lust would demand of her. She prepared herself to give, to chase his kisses and embrace his touch.
Instead, his fingers delicately claimed her arm, pushing the sleeve up and over the bruising.
She felt betrayed for all of a second before she realised she had a golden opportunity; a calm, relaxed Dom before her. No guise of hard ass mechanic or playboy driver.
"Are you going to court?" she asked quietly as he turned her arm in his fingers tentative grasp, eyes inspecting the fading purple and growing green.
"No." he answered, a rough pad of his thumb stroking over the worse of the bruise. It ignited all of her nerve endings, a shiver running through her back. "They have evidence of a minor traffic violation, nothing more." he continued when she thought he wouldn't.
"I'm sorry." she replied. It was her fault; she didn't know how much he would blame her for tangling him in the law's web once more.
"Don't be. It was my choice." He set her sleeve back over her arm once more, guiding it to her lap. She thought he would rescind entirely, but both of his hands remained on her body, one on her thigh, the other resting hot on her knee where she sat twisted to face him.
Silence rang and Letty started to wonder why exactly she was here.
If he needed comfort and therapy, and in no condition for his number one choice of a race track, that left his other passion in life; women. Except, he made no move to her.
His hands stayed where they sat on her jeans, his eyes cast down as he lost himself in his tangled mind once more.
Letty was no therapist for what ailed him.
As much as she hated to shatter the illusion he created for her, she needed to know.
"Why am I here?" but the second the words left her mouth she regretted them. If she broke the dream, would she lose everything? Would he kick her out and never want to see her again? Would silence have brought her closer to what she wanted from him?
Dom withdrew his hands from her.
Letty wished the clock to reverse, her speech retracted, but the seconds ticked on as Dom turned his eyes from her, stretching his arm out to his mobile, dismissing her entirely.
Her heart sank.
The perfect world had cracked down the middle, gone as fast as it had flashed into existence.
He hadn't acknowledged her for a whole week and Letty had ensured it remained that way with her pushing for answers.
Letty unfolded her legs, dignity demanded she escape with what little self-belief she had left.
She was stopped with her toes in one sneaker, a mobile nudged at her arm.
Her question of 'what?' was never formed as she fumbled to hold the mobile he dropped into her hands.
It was backlit on a message conversation.
He'd handed her his mind on a silver platter. All manner of thoughts erupted with how it was a violation into his privacy, but… this was a privacy he was dropping into her lap, literally.
Letty found the screen starting on messages of that morning, mostly about the shitty motorbike Vince was trying to repair, but within that, it was about Dom.
About his lack of concentration throughout work. About his abnormal silence. About his blissful ignorance of the latest in the line of hopeless cougars that had come for an oil change and stopped for a flirt.
Vince ribbed him for his easily irritated mood. Vince mocked his best friend for being so vacant throughout the evening. And then came the races.
Letty lived through the evening via Vince and Dom's texts.
Dom didn't want to race.
Dom didn't chase the latest skimpily dressed female to pass his way.
Dom brushed off the brunette attempting to dry hump him.
Dom didn't even want to go to the races.
The last text in the conversation, after abuse for leaving early, was Vince's angry demand to know what exactly was on Dom's mind to fuck him up so much.
Letty let the phone drop from her eye sight to turn to Dom.
Whatever it was, if this was his behaviour, Vince had justifiable reason to be curious.
But how was Letty at all qualified to sort through the minefield of Dom's thoughts?
How was she to fix this?
More importantly, why had Dom pleaded with her to come over?
Why was he showing her this?
"You." Dom spoke, disrupting all Letty's eccentric theories of violence, drugs, pregnancy and disease.
"What?" Letty asked, shaking off the various avenues her brain had fallen down.
"All day…" Dom grumbled. "You're all I can think about." He looked straight into her eyes for salvation, draining all energy and effort.
Sure, there was the breath of alcohol, the sweet twinge of tipsiness that spoke in his newfound passion and irritation, but the words had been plucked straight out of Letty's wildest dreams.
"Dom…" was it true, was it real, was it everything she ever wanted? It seemed to be.
"I can't get rid of you." he grunted angrily. And the happy Letty universe was cracked once more; of course, he hated feeling that way.
He hung his head and Letty felt much the same.
It was far from the confession she had always wished for.
Gunfire on the television broke the moment. It was an old black and white gangster movie. The mob leader had finished his execution and was starting his spiel about why these idiots were dead and how precious his daughter was, something along those lines Letty was sure. But her mind was spinning into the dangerous waters of self-depreciation.
The tv clicked off and the bed moved as Dom once more stretched out on it, hand behind his head like he was the picture of ease.
Letty found him with his eyes on her once more. But she didn't tell herself it was admiration or lust. No, this time it was curiosity and frustration combined. Why her?
"Don't." Dom's fingers reached around her wrist as she made to stand up. "I don't get it." he grumbled again. "But stay."
There was no flattery, no desire and no filter to his brain.
But Letty was still entirely succumbed to Dom's spell. He could ask her to paint herself red and roll on the carpet and she'd still ask where the paint was before she'd ask why.
She felt awkward in the moment but brought herself back to sit on the bed. "Letty…" His arms reached for her once more.
Not for a kiss, not for a hug, not even to smear her with grease as he so often did at work.
No, this time, his arms wound over her biceps and he tackled, albeit very softly, her to the duvet next to him.
Positioned with a squeak of surprise Letty found herself between Dom and the wall. He rocked his body into comfort under her and she ended with her head on his bicep, staring at his pecs, as his hand snaked to sit on her waist comfortingly.
It took a while for the surprise to die and she evaluated where she was.
Laid out beside the man she had craved and dreamed of, curved against his body like she was made to be there.
Her blind shock turned to silent savouring.
Dom may be weak tonight, he may be tipsy, but this may be the only day she ever had to say she had spent time in his arms.
Whether or not he really wanted this or whether he just wanted a body to lie with, this had been something Letty wanted for a while.
If he was prepared to use her to make himself feel better, surely she could do the same?
She took a deep breath or liquor, cologne and the many smells of the races to re-establish her calm.
He was a drug she was happy to give herself in to.
A drug she found comfort in her addiction to.
A drug that wrapped itself around her as if he never wanted to let her go.
Letty's imagination was too eager to fill in the blanks, to erase the memory of his hatred towards wanting her and the convince her it was worth playing out any best case scenario it could conjure.
So Letty dared to shift her hips into comfort, she risked the wriggle to snake herself to his body.
If this was the closest she got to happiness with Dom in this life, she would accept without protest.
The awkwardness left her, the stiffness of her joints sapped out by his warmth and she relaxed entirely against him.
The room was quiet, except for the deep breathing of the man she was curled around.
She lifted her chin to find him again.
He looked like a god at peace, a smile on his lips, his eyes closed and serene, his arm banded tighter on her hips now he knew she was comfortable wrapped around him.
A peaceful contentment settled in the room.
She tested reality once more, letting her fingers stretch where they rested on his chest, over the hem of the top he wore, touching softly on the firm muscle of his pectoral.
He was real.
She jolted at the responding movement, his fingers slipping under her hoodies, resting snuggly against the bare skin of her hip.
She tested him again, stretching out her toes, barely reaching his mid calves before sliding a leg over one of his.
His answer was a roll of his thumb over her hip, agreement to the experiment that touching was a-okay.
With permission, Letty found herself incapable of resisting her exploration. Her fingers rode the slope of his chest, to the muscle on the slide of his neck. Soft, yet strong.
A contented breath escaped as her hand roamed higher, her thumb tracing the adams apple gentle, the stubble prickling her sensitive skin as she continued.
Fingers gently probed the corded muscles in his neck, fingertips rolling along the sharp jawline.
Her eyes went to his lips again, sealed with a smile she couldn't dare to break such a sight, but when would she next find herself at the mercy of those lips.
She still replayed his kiss over and over on a loop for herself.
No. She wouldn't push it too far.
She had already played with fire for too long.
She tucked her fingers back into her own hand, recoiling it into her body.
As much as she enjoyed her cartography of Dom's body, it was the touch of a virgin, one Dom would surely wish for more maturity from. Only a naïve virgin would be so amazed by each and every angle he had.
Letty chastised herself for looking like an idiot and folded her exploring hands safely away from his bow lips and angular jaw.
Fingers seized her digits before she could sash them away, it drew them back to his throat, back to where they had left. Single handedly, he uncurled each of her fingers one by one and lay them back where they were.
It could only be read as one thing; he liked her hands on him.
She wasn't going to disappoint because there were the shoulder muscles standing tall and proud begging for her to feel their firm tension. She traced down and over his bicep, pinky finger to thumb unable to meet its width despite the various attempts down his arm.
She pressed hard into the muscle, earning a huff of amusement from her canvas. She dragged her fingertips down the band of sinew, following the veins that stood up in the dull desk light.
Warm and solid, she rolled circles into him until she reached the surprising softness of his inner elbow. He shifted with the slight tickle of her feather light touch and she bypassed the sensitive patch to journal along the forearm. Her fingers danced in the dusting of dark hair to see the past. The spark marks from welding, the engine oil that despite several scrubs never seems to shift, the burns and scars from the hot engine and too many dangerous scrapes as he found his feet in the driving seat. She trailed to his hands.
Strong, firm, protective.
His knuckles were scarred from the many fights, the scabs that never properly healed, the cars that fought back.
His fingers curled with hers as she reached the end of his arm.
Short stubby fingernails with the ever-present embedded grease and mud curled around her hand.
As rough as his digits were, they passed an electric pleasure from each pad of his fingertip to her skin.
She closed her eyes with the thousand fantasies that finally found flesh.
No longer would she wonder how Dom felt touching her. No longer would she imagine his touch as her soft and uncertain exploration.
Dom was hard and rough like his fingers.
And he would spark through her like magic.
He released a deep breath and Letty flashed her eyes open, once more looking up at the god beneath her.
He looked tired.
Odd, considering it was only… Letty stretched herself a little more to see the clock on the nightstand.
But the numbers were skewed by the empty glass bottle before them.
Letty narrowed her eyes at the offending object, but found more than the time.
Vodka.
Empty.
Dom wasn't just tipsy.
He was drunk.
He'd finished a bottle of vodka?
Because of her?
Letty shrank away from the nightstand, she curled into him, hiding her face against his chest.